Loading charge for insurance

[Guest Guest6235]

Hi all,

 

Can somebody please explain what the loading charge is for health insurance. I've seen it mentioned in some threads over the last several months, something about if you don't get some sort of insurance in a certain time of arriving in the country then you pay more.

 

Cheers

Edited August 25, 2014 by Guest6235

[Druid]

It's lifetime loading, basically you get charged an additional fee for every year you are over the age of 30, apparently us old farts are more likely to get sick and need more attention, I think you get 6 months from when you arrive to join up and not pay the lifetime loading

[Guest Guest6235]

Ah right, cheers.

Is that loading on private insurance and do every company do it.

[Druid]

Ah right, cheers.

Is that loading on private insurance and do every company do it.

 

Yes it's private Hospital Cover Insurance only, and yes all the providers charge it, the premiums get a bit silly when you get old after they have added the lifetime loading

[Guest Guest6235]

Out of interest what is the going rate for just ambulance insurance cover that people say is a must. My only thought is if you get charged $700 for a call out and you're paying out $80 per month for this, then in a year you've paid for it. I know you can never tell when you'll need an ambulance but if you're generally a fit person you may only require an ambulance once or twice for the family.

[Druid]

Out of interest what is the going rate for just ambulance insurance cover that people say is a must. My only thought is if you get charged $700 for a call out and you're paying out $80 per month for this, then in a year you've paid for it. I know you can never tell when you'll need an ambulance but if you're generally a fit person you may only require an ambulance once or twice for the family.

 

Its very unusual to get Ambulance cover only, normally it's packaged into a basic scheme, HBF do a package called 8 for $8 a week, that gives you things like Ambulance cover, dental, optician, chiro etc, it's a very basic package aimed at the young and the cover is minimal, there is no lifetime loading on these packages, it's only applicable to hospital cover.

[annjean]

I have never seen Ambulance cover that expensive, for 2 of us including dental it costs us $38.00 a fortnight.

[Rossmoyne]

Apparently Ambulance cover has not been provided by St Johns Ambulance direct to the public for about 15 years... didn't know that until recently.... ambulance cover is now built into private health cover.

[SJT]

We got our ambulance only cover from Bupa, it was $63 for the year. Hope this helps.

[Guest Guest6235]

We got our ambulance only cover from Bupa, it was $63 for the year. Hope this helps.

Cheers,

 

Is this the only private insurance you have or do you have dentist etc also.

[Rossmoyne]

Cheers,

 

Is this the only private insurance you have or do you have dentist etc also.

 

Keefo dental is so expensive in Australia and not available on Medicare, although school children have access to basic care through the Health Dept (not Orthodontics though). Even if you don't have full private medical insurance, you would be well advised to look at cover for the basic ancillaries, like dental, ambulance, optical, chiropractic, physio, etc. When you look at what you would pay in the loading charge, and again for the Medicare fees through your tax return for not having private health insurance, you will be quids in for having basic cover.

 

The whole subject of private health insurance and whether to have it or not is very confusing at times. Heaps of info on the internet and there have been some very informative threads on here and PIO in the past.... might be worth a little search and read time....

 

We have had private health cover the whole time we have been in Oz (23 years this week). We had private health cover with BUPA in UK before we came and just continued it in a lower format with just ancillary level until we were in a position to upgrade to hospital cover as well. Now being retired it is a bit of an expense, but it will be the last economy we make.

 

It is hard to get your head around it all so good luck and keep coming back with those questions....

[Guest Guest6235]

Yes cheers Ross, thanks for the advice. May look at what you suggest and then upgrade the dental treatment when our daughter is older.

 

I'm aware that dental is expensive & not on medicare...Unfortunately. I was just wondering if SJT had this or any other insurance apart from their ambulance cover & how they manage on it.

[Rossmoyne]

Keefo, my personal opinion is that you cannot manage on no private health insurance of some sort. You never know what will happen if you have kids.... and even if you don't....and just one ambulance trip can cost you upwards of $700. Just fine tune the cover you have to what you can afford and cover the most basic things like ambulance, dental, optical. The rest will come with time as you get settled. Isn't that what insurance of any kind is about anyway? Well done for researching it all though and thinking through the big issues.

[Druid]

I have HBF Essentials Extra, it costs me. $90 month and gives reasonable level of cover on most things, including ambulance, I have just got a years worth of money back with a few trips to the dentist and it still cost me $1500 on top, the missus wiped out the optical earlier on in the year, so the $90 month is well worth it.

[nikkiwd]

we took out basic hospital but pretty good extras cover with HCF and we pay $187 per month for our family of 4. It is quite costly but we have been warned about the cost of the dentist here and my hubby does have problems with his teeth (been told he may need root canal in future). Things like ambo, chiro, podiatrists, orthodontics etc is covered as well.

We may amend our cover at some point but at least we don't need to worry about finding large chunks of money to pay for any of these things in the mean time.

[Lou8670]

It's lifetime loading, basically you get charged an additional fee for every year you are over the age of 30, apparently us old farts are more likely to get sick and need more attention, I think you get 6 months from when you arrive to join up and not pay the lifetime loading

 

Who can we go to for advice on this @Druid? I'm 43 and OH is 36. I had it in my head for some reason it only mattered if you earned over a certain amount but forgotten people had mentioned "lifetime loading"

[Lou8670]

@Keefo we have ambulance cover like SJT and it is JUST ambulance only at $63 for the year for a family of 5

[Guest Guest6235]

Cheers Lou,

 

Main thing I'm worried about is dentist cover as I'm guessing my daughter will need braces in the future if she takes after me.

Some on this forum & PIO have stated they have had to pay big gap payments even with good insurance cover for their previous medical conditions, but mentioned if they had said they were covered with Medicare only that they wouldn't have had those costs!!!

[Druid]

Who can we go to for advice on this @Druid? I'm 43 and OH is 36. I had it in my head for some reason it only mattered if you earned over a certain amount but forgotten people had mentioned "lifetime loading"

 

Most shopping malls have a Medibank or HBF office, call in when passing and talk to an advisor, that's what they are there for

[nikkiwd]

medicare apparently covers emergency treatment in hospital hence why I just got basic hospital, I have actually been told by a friend that if we had to go to hospital tell them we have no private cover as there are still gap payments if treated privately. Although our private cover has 'no-gap arrangements' with participating doctors. It is all very complicated!

[Druid]

medicare apparently covers emergency treatment in hospital hence why I just got basic hospital, I have actually been told by a friend that if we had to go to hospital tell them we have no private cover as there are still gap payments if treated privately. Although our private cover has 'no-gap arrangements' with participating doctors. It is all very complicated!

 

Nikki, I, you may have been misinformed, my understanding of the conversation I had with a lady from HBF is that if you have any level of hospital cover, even the lowest level, which exempts you from the Medicare levy on your tax return you will be treated as private at hospital, which means you will have huge gap payments to make, so in essence, it's actually more financially beneficial to take out the all singing all dancing super duper platinum package , not only does this exempt you from the Medicare levy, but it also reduces the gap payments considerably, I would think that if you get taken into hospital even in an emergency and you don't declare that you have private cover the tax man is going to want to know about it.

 

A colleague at work and his friend had a serious coming together on dirt bikes in the bush, both ended up with broken bones in hospital my colleague had no private cover, all of his hospital expenses were covered 100% by Medicare, his friend had a basic Bupa package, he ended up $10k out of pocket........... Go figure.

 

Any one else shed some light on the subject.

[Guest Guest6235]

medicare apparently covers emergency treatment in hospital hence why I just got basic hospital, I have actually been told by a friend that if we had to go to hospital tell them we have no private cover as there are still gap payments if treated privately. Although our private cover has 'no-gap arrangements' with participating doctors. It is all very complicated!

Cheers Nikki,

 

How's things out there now, have you managed to find work? Last time you mentioned you had to weigh up a job you were offered against the cost of childcare & you didn't think it was worth it.

On your health insurance cost that seems like a big monthly expense, although I'm sure there are much more expensive options. Can you just do orthodontic insurance. Not really sure I'll really use physio, podiatry, chiro etc.

[Arwen]

Nikki, I, you may have been misinformed, my understanding of the conversation I had with a lady from HBF is that if you have any level of hospital cover, even the lowest level, which exempts you from the Medicare levy on your tax return you will be treated as private at hospital, which means you will have huge gap payments to make, so in essence, it's actually more financially beneficial to take out the all singing all dancing super duper platinum package , not only does this exempt you from the Medicare levy, but it also reduces the gap payments considerably, I would think that if you get taken into hospital even in an emergency and you don't declare that you have private cover the tax man is going to want to know about it.

 

A colleague at work and his friend had a serious coming together on dirt bikes in the bush, both ended up with broken bones in hospital my colleague had no private cover, all of his hospital expenses were covered 100% by Medicare, his friend had a basic Bupa package, he ended up $10k out of pocket........... Go figure.

 

Any one else shed some light on the subject.

 

if you get taken into hospital as an emergency you get treated as just that, even if you have private. That's what happened with my daughter and there have been no tax repercussions.

[Lou8670]

Nikki, I, you may have been misinformed, my understanding of the conversation I had with a lady from HBF is that if you have any level of hospital cover, even the lowest level, which exempts you from the Medicare levy on your tax return you will be treated as private at hospital, which means you will have huge gap payments to make, so in essence, it's actually more financially beneficial to take out the all singing all dancing super duper platinum package , not only does this exempt you from the Medicare levy, but it also reduces the gap payments considerably, I would think that if you get taken into hospital even in an emergency and you don't declare that you have private cover the tax man is going to want to know about it.

 

A colleague at work and his friend had a serious coming together on dirt bikes in the bush, both ended up with broken bones in hospital my colleague had no private cover, all of his hospital expenses were covered 100% by Medicare, his friend had a basic Bupa package, he ended up $10k out of pocket........... Go figure.

 

Any one else shed some light on the subject.

 

This used to happen all the time in the UK too. If you opt for private healthcare then any gaps in your private insurance have to be covered by you as you opted to go private when you were admitted to hospital. I know it doesn't make sense but it happens all the time which has always made me reluctant to take out private medical insurance.

[Guest Guest6235]

This is why if you had never had private insurance in the UK (we never have) then why worry now. I'm sure loads of Aussies don't have it. We go on a waiting list in the UK to see a specialist and it's no different in oz. As I've mentioned previously it's the dentist I can see as the major cost.